Electron Correlations in Plasma Line Broadening

A method of including electron correlations in the relaxation theory for spectral line broadening in plasmas is presented. The effect of these correlations in the relaxation theory is compared with the analogous results in the impact theory; numerical comparisons are made for the Lyman-$\alpha$ line of hydrogen. In particular, it is shown that the impact-parameter cutoff used in the impact theory constitutes a very good approximation to the effect of these correlations.